5.30.2016

I have, as most kids, had several big 'dream what you're going to be when you grow up' moments throughout the course of my life. The one I'm currently working to fulfill is being a writer/author/rock star of the written word. You're helping with that just by being here, so thank you.

Dreams are a funny thing. As a child, we're taught to dream. Dream big. Dream out loud. The word 'impossible' hasn't become part of our vocabulary (and if we're lucky, doesn't for quite some time in to our adulthood). The blessing and curse of childhood dreams is that we don't truly have a grasp of the concept that there will be some work required to actually seeing these dreams come to fruition.

I dreamed of becoming an Astronaut (along with DJ, spy, best-selling author, rock star). This was fueled by Buck Rogers, Space1999, Battlestar Galactica, Battle Of The Planets and any of the other dozens of sci-fi media I swam in as a youth.

As I was walking to class one morning, I saw on the television in the middle school library a sight that brought the reality of that dream home. I saw the explosion of the Challenger space shuttle. I didn't stop dreaming of being an astronaut and seeing space, but the reality of the danger kicked in. And my mind crafted the dream to have different facets. Could I get in to space without going the military route? Would there be a point in my time where DJ's, spies, best-selling authors, or rock stars would be sent in to space? The author brain of mine certainly conceived of that reality. So...I was good. The dream of astronaut wasn't abandoned, just put on the shelf for a time when other things fell in to place. Like becoming a rockstar or any of the other things I wanted to be as a child.

I work in IT by day (and at times by night). I make a living. I'm happy with the work I do here. I help people. I help keep a large number of retail stores operational across the country.

Is it my dream job? I'm not sure that's a fair question. When I was a kid, there wasn't any such thing as 'IT.' The only truly glamorized career tract in that venue was the ever nebulous and nefarious 'hacker.'
Could IT be a dream job for a child these days? Sure.

Could I get bitter about the whole thing? I mean, at first blush not a single one of my childhood dreams has come to fruition. So what the hell man?! Let's take a look at that for a second,though. When you get down to it, it's really a matter of perspective.

The only dream jobs of mine that I haven't actually done outright are astronaut and spy.
My first DJ gig was in Junior High. I deejayed a party on a spring afternoon at the Westerville teen hot spot known as Flamingo Isle. Club sound-system. Yours truly spinning vinyl in the booth. I wasn't very good. I deejayed a few parties in the 30 years since. Truth be told, I'm still not very good. I have albums. I have turntables. I can weave a decent set. But at this point it's no longer a dream. Just something fun I do that's probably more annoying than anything. So...DJ. Check.

Rock star? Dude. Yeah. In the early 90's I was the Keytar/Harmonica/African Wooden Flute/Garage-sale Turntablist/Backing Vocals/Co-Lyricist of the seminal FoodCore Metal band...Columbus Ohio's very own Devilcake. I re-joined the band later for a few years in the early 2000's and we wound up playing side stage at Polaris. They're still playing as I understand it, albeit minus a certain chubby keyboard player with a samurai hair-do.

And that's not where the rock star dream ended for me either. I had fun being on stage with Devilcake. I fed off the energy of the crowd. But in 2008, that was elevated to a whole new level when I entered a contest on Guitar Center's web site...and won. So for 6 days and 5 night...4 cities, I was a rock star. Tour bus, guitar tech, roadies, tour managers. The works. It was surreal. There are a ton of posts on this very blog about the experience (look for the label "Rock and Roll Fantasy Camp" over on the right hand sidebar).

It gave me some serious perspective. And yes...it was actually a dream that came true.

But Todd...you're not still a rock star. How can you say that the dream came true?

That's a very good question. And I've thought a lot about that. It comes down to framing and context. As a teen learning to play harmonica and guitar, there were the inevitable dreams of being a rock star. Then later in my college years, with Devilcake. And again in my 30's with Devilcake. But it wasn't until the Rock and Roll Fantasy Camp that I can I honestly say that the rock star dream was fully realized.

And here's the weird thing, the thing that melts my head when I really stop to think about it. When the dream actually did come true, I realized that it didn't fit. It didn't fit the way I was wired. I'm sure there are aspects of the life I was living at the time that cloud this perception and that if I were to win that same contest again today, it might be different. But the simple answer is that I'm simply not wired to be a rock star. There were some amazing moments during that experience. But there were also some terrifying moments of self-realization.

But the fact remains. For 6 days, I was a rock star. I was in a band that played to sold out crowds at the State Theater in Phoenix, the Hard Rock Casino in Vegas, the Fillmore East in San Francisco, and the House of Blues in L.A. And no one can take that away.

And now this dream of being a writer. I am a writer. It has been a murky pool of self-doubt over the years as to whether or not I've got something something write that people actually want to read.

Truth of the matter is, though, whether 10 people or 10,000 people or no people read this or anything else I write--I will still write.

I no longer view being a writer as a dream to be fulfilled. It's a calling. I have stories to tell. Whether I use the written word, music, video, or photography--I will tell the stories floating in my head and on my heart.

I have no choice. I can't not write.

That's how I know I'm a writer.

The fact that more people are reading this blog is how I know that I'm settling in to "my voice"--that particular style or flavor that let you know who you're reading.

When I post these little ditties up here in the blogosphere, I keep track of how many times I click on a page before it's fully ready (usually 4). Any count higher than that--even if it's only 1--is one step closer to the dream.

My writing dream has shifted. I used to dream of seeing my name and work on the New York Times Bestseller list (and don't get me wrong, that will still be a nice thing to see when it happens), but recently I have shifted the dream and goal for my writing.

I want my writing to inspire.

I want someone to read this and think, "Wow...here's this dude. This everyday dude from Ohio just putting his heart and soul out there for the world to see and not giving a rat's ass what anyone thinks about it. If he can do that, maybe someone will want to read my story."

Everyone of us has a story. A dream. A thing that drives us. It's inspiring, as dreamers, to hear of other people achieving their dreams.

You know what else is inspiring? Hearing the story of someone struggling on the way to their dream but not giving up--just going for it anyway.

THAT is the shit that keeps me going.

And that is what you, dear reader, provide for me when you come here. When you click on the link to this blog. When you tell your friends. When you share the link because something I wrote resonated with you on a fundamental level. Each time you do that, you light one more candle on my path. You bring me once step closer to fulfilling my dream.

And for that, I am blessed and eternally grateful.

If it's ok with you, I'm going to keep writing. But as a writer, I'm also a reader. So tell me, what's your story?

5.24.2016

I had a really cool post in my head yesterday that I never got around to posting. It has to do with Rockstar vs. Working Musician. I never actually got around to writing it at lunch yesterday, but it's still in the forefront of my brain, so there's a good chance it will be written tomorrow at lunch. Or my next lunch break, whenever that might actually wind up being.

But today's lunchtime bloggy blog goodness looks at something else. An invention by Dr. Emmett Lathrop Brown, PhD. I am speaking of course of the Flux Capacitor. Now it's been a while since I did my temporal mechanics dissertation, so please forgive me if I generalize. The concept behind the flux capacitor is like a regular capacitor, only different. The traditional capacitor is a two-poled structure and is used to hold electricity in a field state. The Flux Capacitor is a tri-poled system designed to hold a massive burst of energy. The field state created actually shifts the temporal and spatial particles and allows the device housing it to guide the resulting wave. In laymen's terms, there's a big flash and you travel through time. I'm sorry...I said I was a bit rusty and I'm not sure where my term papers are these days.
And you're sitting there asking yourself, so what, Todd? Everyone knows that. Doc Brown's work is heralded in most Terran systems as bridging the gap between Einstein's theories and Rambaldi's heretical musings from the 15th century.

And you're right. I'm not here to talk about what every 4th grader learns about quantum mechanics. I'm here to see what happens if we apply the theory behind the Flux Capacitor elsewhere in our lives.

I didn't slip on the toilet seat whilst hanging a clock, but I did get hit with this imagery on the way in to work...well...actually about 3 hours in to work. Why it happened is the source for my paper journals, but the result gets to live here for all y'all to see.

People measure others in their capacity to do something. A person's capacity to change. A person's capacity to love. To care. Their capacity to feel and sense what is actually going on around them (not just the trappings of this ride that we've all agreed to be on and pretend it's not actually happening).

I think most poets will see that the capacitor in these quips is usually a single thing. The heart. Or the mind. Sometimes it's the soul that gets the nod.

But what if it's not?

What if what it takes to reach our ultimate capacity as luminous beings of light is a flux capacitor?

Dude. Does your boss know that you're smoking your lunch?
No. They don't. Because, I'm not. But I can see where you're coming from. But hear me out (or don't....really. It's your call.) ?No...here's what I mean.

The Flux Capacitor is a tri-poled mechanism, which takes it out of the realm of binary. Taking it out of the realm of binary puts it in the fuzzy realm of crazy quantum mechanics. And the more we find out about that, the more we find our body is a ridiculously scaled model of that quantum realm. So...back to the Flux Capacitor. With regards to our body, the three poles are mind, heart, soul.

And the sudden burst of energy? That's any event in our lives that causes us to take pause. To take stock. To question the very fabric of the universe, or at the very least what the fuck thread we're supposed to be pulling or sewing in said universal fabric.

It doesn't have to be a serious crisis of faith that causes that pause. It could be that perfect moment when you are caught up in the laughter and joy of hanging with your friends. It could be the smiling eyes of your child as they wake you up with those too sloppy but ever too quickly gone loving kisses as the tell you how much they love you.

It could be the new sunrise. Or the daily death of the sun over the collapsing pole barn.

Point is, I can't tell you what that burst of energy is or will be for you. And you can't tell what it will be for another person. Sure, the real Flux Capacitor generates its field and engages in the spatial/temporal shift when it is charged with 1.21 GigaWatts. I would venture to say the energy contained in whatever triggers it for your is on the order of magnitudes greater than that amount.

And what of the time/space shift, you ask?

Again, your mileage may very, but when it happens to me I know that this world, the place my feet call the earth gets somewhat fuzzy. It's like looking through the plastic you put over your windows in the winter time to keep the drafts of cool air out. It's like I know there's something outside the window, something familiar. But I just can't bring it in to focus. To do so would require ripping off the plastic and letting the cold air in.

I think the people in the history of human kind that have navigated and transcended learned this relationship somewhere along the way. They didn't hesitate to peel back that plastic sheen.

And they learned another truth, one picked up so eloquently by Dr. B. Banzai.
No matter where you go, there you are.

5.20.2016

I'm a parent. I have been for almost 22 years now. It gets you thinking. Like all the time thinking. The primary thought throughout my child's growth to adulthood has been, "have I provided enough?" Enough life lessons. Enough nurturing. Enough good memories to sustain through the dark days my child may or may not face in their life?

I have reached a conclusion to that line of questioning.

Who the fuck knows?

I have been thinking recently about who gets revered in our society. And as my brain is wont to do, I tie things I see in with things I remember (or think I remember) from my own life.

I remember as children, and then later as new parents, the eternal struggle to make peace for our children.
A little girl comes home from school in tears because a little boy pushed her down on the playground.
A little boy comes home from school in tears because another child took their toy.

The little girl is told that it's because that little boy likes you. He has a crush on you.
The little boy is told that it's because that other child is jealous and he should share with them in case they don't have all the same benefits as he does.
Parents, I'm going to let you in on a little secret that you may not want to hear.

Sometimes kids are assholes.

Stop making excuses for them.

By telling your daughter that behavior is acceptable, even desired, they will grow to think that abuse and mistreatment is their partner's way of showing affection. And believe me, that's a fucked up world view to have.

By telling your son to share, and not to get so upset, you are causing him to question those times when he truly needs or wants to be selfish. Sharing is learned in children. It's not inherent.

When I was a child, I think I was in late elementary school, my papaw bought me a radio from the flea market. My younger cousin came out to visit us at the farm. She wanted to see my radio. I didn't want to share. Sure, it was a used radio. But it was new to me. And more importantly in the childhood quest to be the favorite grandchild, I wanted to bask in the fact that Papaw bought it for me. Things escalated. Phrases like, "I bought the goddamned thing, so I can say who gets to play with it" were bandied about. And eventually the radio went flying across the room. It hit the door frame and broke. It was one of the few times I truly got a glimpse of my papaw's anger.

But it triggered something else. It served as an example that if I didn't agree with something, it was better to just suck it up than to cause a fight and wind up losing a thing all together.

Was my cousin spoiled and playing the only grand-daughter card? Oh, I'm sure of it. Was I being a little shit about a used radio? You bet I was.

I would have shared. Eventually. The newness of the thing hadn't worn off yet. And one thing I've learned about myself. If I get something new (even a magazine), I have to be the one to make the cool discoveries about it. If I get a new magazine and someone else reads it first and wants to talk about the articles, there's a good chance I won't read that magazine with anything approaching the same level of excitement that prompted me to buy it in the first place.

It's weird, I know. But I'm kind of an asshole about it. I'm not asking you accept that, nor do I want you to make excuses for me. Just understand that there are things I'm a jackass about. You can call me on it and I'll most likely agree. I'll own it.

As a society, though, I think we've shifted focus. Instead of calling someone out on something and holding them accountable, we're making excuses. As though the backstory always justifies the behavior.

Back to our previous example. The little girl should be told that it's not ok to hurt another person. And she should never think that it's ok to do that to someone or have it done to them. Don't try to put a positive spin on it. Not everything has a positive spin.

The little boy? I guess looking back, that little boy was really me with the radio. I think in retrospect, I would have liked the adults in the room to understand how excited I was and how I didn't really want to share just then and to let me have my fun. Having my thing taken from me just so it would be 'fair' to my cousin was kind of a bullshit move. The world doesn't work like that. There are things that people have that, sure, would be nice to have. But I can't go take them just because it's not fair that they have them and I don't.

I guess the other side of the lesson is, as adults we have a chance to help make sure our children don't grow up to be assholes. That we give them the kind of guidance necessary to not be shitty to another person.

It's almost as hard as recognizing that sometimes we're going to drop that ball. At least once.

Sometimes, after the kids at school have been mean because she's the new kid, it's enough to hold her close and wipe the tears from her eyes, while gently telling her, "shhhh...it's ok sweetie. Those kids are assholes."

If nothing else, she should have a finely developed sense of when someone is being an asshole and when to steer clear of them.

Now, if we can get the rest of society to stop revering assholes, we'll be in good shape.

5.19.2016

Dick Magnet
I have come to the conclusion that as a society, we suck as humans sometimes. I think men are a little higher up in that ranking. I realize that as a member of our species that has a penis, I am lumping myself in this mix. And that's OK. I'm an asshole and a dick sometimes. I will readily admit this. But, as of late, I've had a couple of things happen that give me pause and make me think about the way people treat each other.

The first one was an incident that happened a few weeks back. I was on my way to a meeting of the writing group I belong to and was at a traffic light. I was in my patented powder blue tuxedo t-shirt and had on my Pabst Blue Ribbon trucker's cap, as ya do. Window was down and I was probably jamming to either some old school hip hop or one of the dance stations on XM.

Perhaps it's the bright green car. Or the fact that I'm singing whatever I was singing like I didn't have a care in the world. I can't be certain what caused the next series of eye-popping events to unfold.

An orange Mustang pulls up to my left at the light and I start hearing whistling and cat calls. I look in my mirrors to see if there is a car of women anywhere around that might be the cause for this.

Now...there's a few things that troubled me about this in retrospect. The first being that my first reaction was to see if there were any women around that might be the object of these rather misguided attentions. As if that kind of abhorrent behavior should only be directed toward women.

The second is...as soon as I realized it was directed at me, I became very uncomfortable. I didn't want to make eye contact. I looked at the light...staring at it. Willing it to change from red to green so I could speed away. I felt disgusted. There were a couple of reasons for this. The first was the straight up objectification that I felt. I didn't feel flattered or complimented. I felt gross. I felt like to even acknowledge their calls would be to make me as slimy as they were. It was a terrible sensation that I hadn't felt in quite a long time. The second reason for the disgust was the fact that all over the country, maybe the world, there are people treating other people this way. Not just men being assholes to women (although that's likely the largest demographic), but people treating other people as objectified pieces of meat.

It completely sucked.

Tyler's Silver Lining
I'm gonna start this bit off with a pic of a text exchange that I had.

So being a writer, I have already thought of the circumstances behind how Tyler got the wrong number. He was out. He was hitting on a woman who said her name was Katie. He asked for her number in what I can only assume was a smooth lol kind of way that the kids ask for numbers these days. She didn't want to be completely rude (a free drink is a free drink). So she gives him a number. Maybe one or two digits are transposed. And voila. Tyler thinks he's a stud. Katie gets her drink on. And the world keeps on spinning.

A couple other options. Maybe Katie wrote it on a napkin. Something caused the ink to smear. Tyler sucks at reading smeared ink napkin phone numbers. Now Katie is pining by her phone wondering why that cute bearded man with the too-perfect flannel hasn't called or texted. I mean, they had a riveting conversation about the over-inflation of IBU percentages in pseudo-microbrew IPA's. What the hell, Tyler?!?

Regardless of how Tyler got the wrong number, intentional or accidental, he had it. And Kudos to Tyler for finding a silver lining. He assumes he was given a fake number. And he assumes I'm a female. I didn't respond to his last message and he followed up an hour later with a message that said 'Text Anytime!'

While I applaud Tyler in that regards, I'm also a little skeeved out by it. Because...dude...you thought you were texting one chick. You realize you aren't and now you start the ball rolling with what you think might be another chick. I really hope this doesn't escalate. I really don't want to reach for my phone and find a pic of Tyler's man berries. Because, again, men are stupid. Now..don't get me wrong...I'm not saying that I've never had exchanges like that before, but I have always made sure such exchanges were welcome. Either way it makes me weep a little bit for humanity. It's like...well, you're not the chick I was hoping for, but maybe just maybe you'll do.

Sorry Tyler, that's not how I roll. Although, I'm not going to lie, I am going to be intentionally obtuse a little while longer just to see what happens.

That's the best part about being a writer. Everything...literally every fucking thing that happens in my life is fodder, inspiration, or motivation for a story.

5.18.2016

Welcome. You may have noticed this time around when you popped on to the olde cooking not cooking blog that you got a warning about Adult Content. Don't worry. I won't be posting any pix of Trump's wife or anything of a pornographic nature on this blog. It occurred to me that children are getting more tech savvy at an increasingly younger age. It also occurred to me that I say fuck. Like, a lot. So. There you have it.

I'm going to start off by saying this. I'm not a doctor. I'm not a nutritionist. I'm not a trainer. In short there is absolutely no reason to take any of what follows as anything but the rantings of someone who's figured some shit out in his 44 years on this floating hunk of space rock.

Now the meat of it.

It's easy to be fat.

It's stupidly, ridiculously easy to be fat in our society. By 'our society' I mean what is sometimes called Western Civilization. Not only is it easy to be fat, I would venture to say it's encouraged. Now as I stated earlier, your mileage may vary, but for me--it's clearly easy to see that it's much more convenient to be fat than it is to be healthy.

I live in a little pocket where I have a short walk to some great restaurants, yet I frequently find myself ordering delivery. Which winds up being twice as expensive and since you can't order single servings when you order delivery, I almost always wind up over eating because it's there.

Our fast pas

*ANNNNNNNNND Cue Time Looping Sequence*

Frequent visitors to this blog will notice that I have a pattern. Sometimes I will write something, get annoyed with it, and then come back to it later after it's had a chance to simmer in its own juices.

This post is no exception. I started this post after participating in another 'get off your ass and get healthy in X days' challenge. I lost. Not because I wasn't capable. But because I didn't track my points.

Mainly because I didn't really want a barometer. That's the part that felt fake to me. I was diagnosed in December with diabetes. So. That was my wake-up call. My A1C numbers (I think that's the right term) were just over the hump from pre-diabetic to diabetic. So they put me on pills to control my blood sugar. And I was given very strong dietary guidelines of what kinds of foods I should and shouldn't be eating. One of my no-no foods was pizza. I could tell right away we were going to have a problem. You can, with almost scientific precision, determine the kind of week I have had overall by how many pizza boxes are stacked on my stove waiting to be thrown in to the dumpster.

This week has been kind of a peach. I won't tell you how many boxes. Because it doesn't matter. The point is...there was a moment of abject terror where I thought I was going to have to completely turn my eating habits on their ear (again) because of this diabetes thing.

And the truth is, that's exactly what I SHOULD have done.
But I didn't. Instead, they gave me a pill. Three months later my A1C is down a whole point. Back in to pre-diabetic land. Am I going to stop taking the meds? No. That would be foolish (for now). Besides, it's easy to get wrapped up in the notion that a pill is going to fix things. It's convenient.

The motivation isn't there right now. I know it should be. But part of me is kind of beat down by how easy it is to be fat. You can have things delivered. You can take a pill. You can order your groceries online and just go pick them up. You don't even need to get out of your car now.

Which...to be fair....that might be the way to go. I have be honest. I don't so much mind the cooking for one. But the shopping for one? That shit is depressing. Buying things that are single serving size actually cost more. It's sad, but it is cheaper for me to buy the "regular" size products and throw the leftovers away.

I'll snap out of this. I know I will. Just a little funk. Or rather a chunky funk. But not chunky monkey...never was a fan of that flavor.

There's more I have to say on this, I'm sure, but Top Gun is on and I'm a sucker for the Navy's single best recruitment video of all time.

Don't worry, we'll talk soon. And to the new people, welcome. Oh...yeah...that's right...there appears to be a little bit of an up-tick in traffic to the blog. Which is cool.

Alright peeps, have a great rest of your evening. Let's get together for lunch tomorrow.

5.03.2016

You may recall in a post last week (linked HERE for your convenience), I talked about doing a guest post for a friend and fellow author. If I remember correctly, I wasn't sure when or if he would actually use the post. Turns out he did and you can find that post HERE. Now, while it didn't necessarily help traffic to his blog much (I am an acquired taste, afterall), it did drive a little but of traffic to this here spot in the blogosphere, at least for a day or so. Which was cool in my humble opinion. That's what our writing group (and I hope most of them) is really about, helping to elevate our fellow authors.

As Tim mentioned to me in a separate message, it's all about timing. And it is.

My dad and I have had that conversation often. He is one of my biggest fans and supporters. Many times the support comes in the form of an athletic company's slogan, "Just Do It." Although usually he just looks at me and says, "Nike, dude. What are you waiting for?"

It's a fair question. I know to those who enjoy reading my work that perhaps it seems I'm doing this whole 'becoming a published author/writing books" thing extreeeeeeeemly slowly. But much like the point in the Muse/Inspiration post, I explained to Dad last weekend, that it really wasn't like turning on the light switch.

It is very much a timing thing.

In fact, it's almost entirely a timing thing. If you do any reading on what it takes to be a writer (or go to any workshops), they will preach the merits of always having a certain time of day to write. Develop the habits and rituals so that when that time of day comes or you find yourself in that particular writing spot wherever that may be, your brain's muscle memory will kick in and be all, "oh shit! This is when it's time for us to write. Time to bleed out the magical prose that's going to make us independently wealthy. Let's DO THIS!!!"

Right? I mean that's how it works, if you believe those authors who have advanced so far in their career that all they have time for is teaching others how to write and be successful.

I would love it if that were the case. Most working authors that I have met have some variation of that. Others write when they can--grateful for the stolen minutes they can spend dancing with the keyboard.

I'm in the second group. I know that if I can take a lunch, I'll get an hour for that lunch. I also know that like most Americans, I eat too fast. This gives me about 35-45 minutes to write. Sometimes it's in my journal. Sometimes it's here, giving you some of that down home lunchtime bloggy goodness. That is if I get an uninterrupted lunch.

If not, I can do some writing in the morning before work. This was my modus operandi when I was cranking out some work for NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month) last November. And I have found that I can also get a good hour or two if I'm lucky before the head hits the pillow. But there is just enough variation in my schedule that it becomes difficult to set these times/rituals in stone.

And that's just the physical side of it. There is very much the mental side of it. When I write, I am for the most part transcribing a movie I am watching in my head. I should clarify that. For these blog posts, I pretty much just sit here and type thoughts as they cross my brain. Very little editing happens. Unfortunately, there is very little filtering as well. Sorry about that. But, that's the way my mind works. However, when I'm writing a work of fiction, I am not really thinking about what to write as much as I am watching a movie that is playing in my head and trying to put that movie in to words on the page. When that happens, I pretty much lose track of time. It's pretty trippy and pretty fantastic, if I'm being honest. I'm watching a movie in my mind and then an hour or 3 later, I look down and there it is transcribed on the page/screen/notebook.

I would love to use my lunch breaks and keep advancing the fictional works in progress forward, however with the whole 'time lapse' thing that happens I could easily lose an afternoon. I did that once. At a previous job. I mean...this story HAD to come out. I'm pretty sure it was my brain's way of coping with my first divorce. I wrote what I have come to call my AutoBi-Fi (autobiographical fiction). I can't really read it anymore, but as I was writing it, I was stealing minutes left and right at work to finish that thing. I coincidentally wrote a piece about hating your job (weird how those two things happened at the same time).

So..yeah...it's all about timing. Having the time and the movie reel playing at the same time is what makes the magic happen.

Oh shit, you just got back here from Tim's blog?? You let me ramble on all this time? Yeah. I guess I probably should have waited until you were back, but I wasn't sure I'd have the time.